Knowledge Base

The Scene in Spatial Editor defines how your 3D workflows appear. Here, you can view the current arrangement of models, steps, and interactions, and you can organize them into structured steps. By managing scene states, you control what is visible or active during each workflow stage.

Here is a short overview of the references that can be used in Scene:

• Layers: Layers are a way to organize and manage different elements in the 3D scene. Layers allow you to group, hide, or lock sets of objects to simplify editing and visualization. Each layer can hold a different set of visible items and CAD models.
• Objects: Display and control individual 3D items within the scene. You can select, rename, or adjust properties of each object to manage the scene content.
• Optimization: Tools and options that improve performance and rendering efficiency. Use optimization features to reduce model complexity or adjust visibility without compromising quality.
• 3D model manipulation: Functions for positioning, rotating, and scaling the models within the scene. These tools let you precisely align and adjust models for accurate placement in workflows.

• Show hidden: Makes hidden steps, models, and model parts visible.
• Show connections: Shows and hides the connection lines.
• Transform gizmo: Changes the transformation gizmo settings to Auto, Local, and Global.
• Transformation gizmos: Allows mouse-controlled translation and rotation of parts and items (e.g., instruction components and markers) inside a 3D scene. 

Layers

Layers constitute a way to organize workflow content (such as the instruction component, markers, and other user-created content) in different views. This helps to cluster group elements (such as steps, components, markers, and 3D objects) of a workflow, in various sections or topics. A user can create a layer that defines which elements are visible and which are not, so that when they select that layer later, all the configuration for the visible/invisible content is set. Users can have multiple layers, with each having a purpose.

This distinction between what is visible and what is not in a single layer is relevant only to the Editor. Once the workflow is uploaded to FCC, all layers are merged into a single workflow for playback in the Spatial Workplace app.

Note: The 2D Connector does not replicate the different item visibility between views. All items are visible in the 2D Connector.

 

Objects

Objects include the option to modify the existing elements of a workflow:

• Duplicate: Allows users to duplicate any element (steps or model parts) in a project. The duplicate element is created at the same location as the existing one and can be manipulated using the transformation gizmo.
• Snap: Allows users to move the location of the existing steps, such as the step states, workflow states, components, and markers, to a new location.
• Hide: Hides the selected elements of the project from the view.
• Show: Shows the selected hidden elements of the project. The hidden elements can be selected from the Scene Explorer.
• Show All Hidden: Displays all hidden elements in the project. 
• Isolate: Hides all of the elements of the project except for the selected one.
• Copy/Paste: Allows users to copy any steps and paste them into the same project or into any other open project instance.
• Delete: Deletes the selected element from the project.

Additional actions via the Objects menu:

Using the Objects option in the top menu, the user can:

• Snap: Reposition the instruction component to another location on the model's surface.
• Duplicate: Duplicate the instruction component at the same position and with the same content.
• Line: Draw lines over the model.
• Delete: Remove the instruction component and its contents from the model.

To delete an item, the user can also select it in Scene Explorer and press Delete.

• Remove Internal Parts: Removes all internal model parts that cannot be seen from the outside. Higher resolutions will produce a more accurate result, while lower resolutions will reduce the part count. If the model will not be inspected up close, consider using low resolutions.
• Remove Internal Polygons: Removes all internal part polygons (triangles) that cannot be seen from the outside. Higher resolutions will produce more accurate results but takes longer. If the individual parts are very dense in polygons, consider using higher resolutions to avoid cracks. Otherwise, if the parts are simple or will not be inspected up close, consider using low resolutions.
• Remove Small Parts: Removes small parts based on the given value. A part is removed if all of its dimensions (width, height, and depth) are smaller than the provided maximum dimensions.
• Reduce Polygons: Reduces the polygon (triangle) count via mesh decimation. The polygon target ratio can be used to set the desired target percentage of polygons. The error threshold can be used to stop the reduction if a certain error is reached. A higher threshold would allow more reduction in the cost of quality.
• Merge Parts: When two parts are merged, they are combined into a single new part. This can be used inside a step container for animations, where the merged part behaves like a usual target. When a part with a texture is merged with a part without a texture, the merged part keeps the same color and the texture.

The user can also select the entire 3D model to run the above optimizations.

Once the user has completed mesh decimation on a model, they can assess how the model's visual quality has been affected. If the model still meets the quality standards, they can then check the number of triangles and decide whether to further optimize the model or not.

However, if the model's quality has been significantly compromised and it no longer meets the requirements, the user can use the Back function in the editor to revert the optimization.